Manifesto
and Contributor's Guidelines
(updated 05-15-01)
(want to read the old Manifesto for some weird reason-click here)

Announcement regarding Xena fanfic

Email for Submissions
submissions@altfic.com

Welcome to the Manifesto 

Welcome to the semi- new, updated Manifesto. A lot has changed in the months that the site has been up, a lot has been added and things have been redesigned more than once, and it now has a solo webmaster, but it's still here and the rules for submission are still pretty much the same. As for the purpose of the site, it too has remained largely unchanged. I'm still hoping to avoid being too intensely pretentious (and I'm still sure that you, the readers, will help in this endeavor). Past that, the site's still about fanfiction with strong female images and relationships. Does that mean that everything and everyone has to be lesbian or bi themed? Nope, not at all, but I am looking for stories with strong female leads and relationships at the center-point. The biggest thing I'm looking for, however, is still quality storytelling. Does it mean that the guys have to instantly become invisible or total idiots? Nope, that's not a necessity at all. Strong men are cool even when not the focus. What it does mean is that we're going to try and post stories that show the strong women in active situations,  with a special emphasis on female/female romantic fanfiction. (note: as of  7-29-99 we will not be accepting Xena fanfiction from any author who has not previously been associated with the site--other fandoms are definitely wanted from new authors, and authors on the site are welcome to submit stories from any fandom, including Xena--to read the announcement click here).

What does this mean for you, the viewer?

Well, funny you should ask that, because, among other things, it means we're looking for submissions. In short, you could be part of the consortium. Now before you freak at the notion of not getting anything but group credit for your brilliance. Relax, only the webmaster and associated helpers has to give up personal identity for the hive mind. Contributors are allowed to keep their personal identities. 

A note regarding artwork submissions: at present, outside artwork is not being accepted.

What kind of Submissions are wanted for the Site?
(technical requirements are at the end of the page)

• Fiction with strong women in lead roles (G through R ratings)
• Well structured plots, good writing and grammar.
  • Beta reading is strongly recommended. 
• Humor, action, adventure, and all those good things.
• Willingness to be edited and proofed.
• Finished stories. For a whole lot of reasons, stories won't be posted in parts except in very rare instances, so don't plan on it.
• Romantic Rules of the road.
  • Romantic/sexual relationships that are integral to the story.
  • Relationships that build in realistic logical ways, as opposed to two people just suddenly realizing they have to strip their clothes off, and boff each other right now, for no apparent reason. This is a firm rule.
  • Erotica that's more than just sex. Those nasty old emotion thingies are important, so this is also a firm rule.
  • Reasonably believable relationships. This means if you want to do something outrageous, you may have to work to make it believable. Which is not to say, it can't be done, but if Gabrielle and Callisto abruptly look at each other in the middle of fight, and proclaim their love, you'll have to pull something impressive out of your sleeve to make it work.
• Most fandoms welcome, including but not limited to those listed below (I follow those shows well enough to know the characters and what's going on)
  • Alien Resurrection
  • Ally McBeal
  • Babylon Five
    • Crusade (though I haven't seen much of this one)
  • Buffy The Vampire Slayer
  • Law and Order
  • NYPD Blue
  • Poltergeist: The Legacy
  • The Practice
  • The Pretender
  • Profiler
  • Sports Night
  • Stargate-SG1
  • Star Trek (all incarnations, but Voyager is particularly welcome)
  • The X-Files
  • Any well structured pairing of women for the Subtext Zone (fanfic only for this site--though we'll encourage anyone writing original fiction to post it to one of several good sites).

Things that won't be accepted

• Hard Core Pornography. An overabundance of four letter words and emotionless sex just aren't our thing.
• PWPs. Stories that are just short excuses for explicit sex with little emotional bonding and no plot. 
• Male/Male slash--I have nothing against it, nor the people who create it, but bluntly put, it doesn't float any boats around here, plus there are lots and lots of places to read and publish it on the web. If you've stumbled into Pink Rabbit in search of a place to read or publish m/m slash, we will gladly point you in the right direction, but this rule will not be changing.
• Brutal rape (particularly between lead characters). A little slap and tickle bondage is fine, and the spectre of sexual threat can be an effective storytelling device, but for various reasons, this line will not be crossed on this site.
• Stories with real people (celebrity or otherwise).
• Stories with no strong female characters, or stories in which they get to walk on and walk off. The boys have lots of places to play, but this isn't one of them.
• Mary Sue stories -- These are stories where an original character is just a thin cover for the author's own fantasies of putting themselves into the situation. Invariably far too perfect, Mary Sue's are the real center of the story, and tend to be smarter, faster, stronger, wittier, etc than everyone else and wind up romantically involved with the lead character/s of their choice, while being worshipped and adored by the rest of the cast, and ultimately saving the day.
• Joxer.

Now, that wasn't so hard, was it? Now, that you've made your way through my babbling efforts at laying things out, hopefully you still want to get involved. If you're interested, drop me a line.

Technical Specifications

• Please include the following information with every submission
  • Name:
  • Email: (this is really important--things do get lost or deleted sometimes and without this, I can't find you)
  • Title:
  • Disclaimer: 
  • Rating:
  • Summary: (1 sentence)
  • Spoiler or Other Information: (As needed)
• RTF (Rich Text File) format is preferred for submissions. It will save your formatting, doesn't transmit viruses, and is easiest for us to work with. When you save your file, choose Save As and select rtf. We can read most other formats if for some reason you can't save as rtf. Please, don't save as html. For some reason, that always seems to cost more time than it's intended to save (many long and boring stories...).
• Do not indent (it won't work in html). Instead space once between paragraphs, and use word wrap. This will create the most reliable transfer of your paragraph formatting.
• Insert some kind of break indicator between scenes. The default on this site is six stars with a space between each. * * * * *
• If you have an extremely long story, please break it into the logical parts that you would want your audience to receive it in. Try to keep file length under 100k.
• Make sure to spell check and proof your document. Beta readers are also wonderful things.
• Lastly, make sure to include the name you wish on the story and an email address in the file, so we know how to contact you, if your mail is lost or destroyed.

- PB - Rabbitworks Inc. 
- The Pink Rabbit Consortium
- submissions@altfic.com